Into Wilderness

by Prasanna Parab

Arachnid fest at Amba Ghat at the Spider India meet 2018, with lots of fun and learning all the way.

"Let Nature be thy inspiration and your spirit mingled in it"

All participants at the Ambeshwari Sacred Grove at the Spider India Meet 2018.

On 24th December 2018, Day 1, All participants met at the Go-kul Resort at Amba, breakfast was served at Dosa point, after which the participants assembled for introduction and was followed up by lunch after which the group proceeded to Ambeshwari Sacred Grove which is a Moist Deciduous habitat with lot of spiders. A night session was irresistible to everyone as expected. Snapshots below, all spider images are provided at the end of this blog post.

On 25th December 2018, Day 2, Christmas eve, saw us a bit slow to reach Jhenda Plateau - a lateritic plateau surrounded by Evergreen to semi-evergreen vegetation. A steep climb, a walk into a lateritic crevasse a flowering Orchid, few spiders and an amazing view of the Sahyadri (Western Ghats), were as welcoming as the 'sago khichdi' which was fondly munched upon by all participants after a steep climb. On return, a talk by Divya Uma was efficient enough to fade our sleepy eyes. Homegrown 'Santa', Anubhav Agarwal got us some lovely chocolates followed by the cake cutting. The musical night was as crazy as the day, with Mangirish Dharwadkar, Rakhi ma'am and Anupam sir impressing us with their singing abilities, not the least Dr. Atul Vartak stole the show with silent song which was followed up by 'Zhingat' with everyone on the dance floor. Snapshots below :

On 26th December 2018, Day 3, concluding day everyone seemingly relaxed, a few talks and an important one by Rohit from ATREE. We also had interesting views from a compound microscope, thanks to Siddharth Kulkarni, and everyone was also seen busy in making the arachnid checklist for the 3 days. Snapshots below:

Along with a lot of fun we did photograph a lot of spiders, some highlights below :